A Staffordshire detective has described her role as ‘the best job but the best kept secret’.
In fact, Detective Sergeant Michelle Banks says she sees recruitment and retention of experienced officers as the biggest challenge for the detective role, particularly as it impacts on investigations.
Michelle, who is based at Lichfield CID, says her strong sense of community meant she aspired to become a police officer from an early age and, after first joining as a Special, she has been with the Force for 26 years.
She explained: “At this time from my point of view as a supervising officer, I see the biggest challenge is getting experienced officers with the dedication to work in this environment.
“Recruitment and retention in this department are our biggest issues and current staff now are at saturation and getting to the point that they cannot take on any further investigations. I believe detectives take on extra responsibility and are expected to be robust and it takes a special kind of police officer to carry that responsibility and pressure.
“Workloads are often high and due to the nature of the investigations we do, they can take months, sometimes years in the case of complex fraud, to complete, and you need to be methodical and organised to ‘keep all the plates spinning’.”
Michelle became a detective in 1999 but didn’t progress to DS until 2017 as she said she was more interested in the investigation side of policing: “Some loved traffic, some wanted to be dog handlers, my niche was investigations. I was lucky to be asked to work on a murder inquiry and then was allowed to complete a CID aide and I loved it and wanted to do it full-time.”
So how has her role changed?
Michelle explained: “Where to start! The changes are constant. CID used to be a revered position and thought to be one of the best roles in the police. It has always attracted long hours and responsibility of the most serious investigations but, due to that, it can have a detrimental effect on family life and welfare.
“I feel a detective needs to be extra dedicated to the role as, once responsibility for an investigation lies with you, it’s not a case of handing it over to the next shift or leaving it until tomorrow; you need to remain on duty until the job is done.
“The type of crime we now face has also changed – with social media and mobile telephones, almost every crime involves the examination of devices and the reviewing of pages and pages of data as a result.”
Michelle said the recruitment issue could be improved by officers being offered taster CID sessions.
She explained: “The opportunities to complete attachments or aides are not there like they used to be as officers cannot get released from their departments to come and work in CID and therefore they don’t get the insight to what is a very rewarding job. I would go as far as saying some officers don’t even know what we do.
“I think from recruitment there should be breathing space within our response/neighbourhood departments to release staff that are interested so they can come and experience investigations. They, in turn, will go back to their teams and hopefully spread the word on what it is actually like being a detective and how enjoyable it is and therefore drum up more interest.
“It is the best job but lately it seems like it’s the best kept secret too. There is nothing better than the feeling when you have completed a successful investigation which has made a difference to your victim’s life, or you have worked for months building a complex investigation and stopped a series of crimes which otherwise would have continued and impacted on many more people.
“I have several victims who keep in touch with me from many years ago. They reported rapes and believe I was the catalyst to them getting their lives back; they see me as the person who helped them get control back and whether it was successful at court most times in irrelevant. That feeling is priceless and very humbling. I have spoken about this on many occasions with colleagues and I know they feel the same.”
Michelle often works beyond the end of her shift but only for short periods of time with her previous experience enabling her to avoid work impacting on her physical or mental health.
She added: “I don’t feel I’m personally affected but I have a lot of experience in this department and that helps me not to worry and stress.
“I do think it can be quite pressured within CID but with the right training and support it is manageable. The long shifts can have short-term impact on sleep but, as we don’t work those type of shifts that often, that can be managed. I personally don’t have any pressure from my family life but I understand that it takes some juggling with young families which can mean extra pressure on officers.”
Michelle continues: “My work has its moments but I don’t generally feel under pressure. That comes from either time pressure with custody clocks or from the volume of demand and not wanting to overload my teams. I think I cope well with the pressure in the office but I think it helps that I’ve been here for a long time.”
She also said the pandemic has inevitably changed the way she works: “We have no choice, we all have to work safer and smarter. We are doing far more over the telephone and via the internet which I found difficult at the start but I’m beginning to get more used to it. I still feel like there is nothing better than face to face but unfortunately I think that’s a thing of the past and that makes me a little sad.
“I have also just started to try to work from home on the few occasions when I can - I am lucky that I work with another DS so we try to work this between us. When the current issue with laptops is sorted and once they are rolled out to everyone I will arrange for some of my team to also work from home when they can. I find this difficult as I’ve spent 27 years coming to the station and it feels foreign to me but I’m sure I’ll get used to that too. It is something that is necessary to keep us all safe.”
And Michelle’s final words on her work as a detective: “Being in CID over the years has awarded me some fantastic opportunities. I’ve worked as part of a team of detectives sent from Staffordshire to assist Cambridgeshire Police with their investigation into the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. I worked and lived in London and was part of the massive team of detectives investigating the 7/7 bombing inquiry. I then went on to be seconded to the NCA for a number of years and again lived and worked in central London.
“Taking the tragedy out of the investigations, I am very grateful to have had those experiences and proud that I was able to play a very small part in them. I could not have worked on those and travelled the country had I not have been a detective.
“I love my job and have no plans to return to uniform but I’ve just passed my promotion exam so I may have to.
“Would I take the same career path again with hindsight? Absolutely.”
